USA > Pennsylvania > Prominent and progressive Pennsylvanians of the nineteenth century. Volume I > Part 22
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While Mr. Hyde is esteemed throughout the Keystone State as a legislator, he is still better recognized as an incorporator and
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business man. He is a leading spirit in the Elk County National Bank, and is also largely interested in the banking business at Brockwayville, Pennsylvania. He is one of the chief managers of the Ridgway Building and Loan Association, and of a large num- ber of other financial institutions. A considerable portion of Mr. Hyde's time is taken up with the extensive business of the mer- cantile house of W. H. Hyde & Company, and he is a partner or stockholder in nearly every industrial enterprise in Ridgway. The new opera house in Ridgway engaged considerable of his time in its construction, as well as some of his capital. Among the other concerns with which he is prominently identified are: the Clarion River Railway Company, of which he is President, and the Clarion River Gas Company, of which he is also the presiding official. The Ridgway Light and Heat Company also owes much of its success to his efforts as its President. Mr. Hyde is further interested in a large number of manufacturing and business concerns, and in a number of public institutions. In a word, he is thoroughly identified with the prosperity of Penn- sylvania.
DANIEL KARSNER.
EALOUS in his profession, active in promulgating Z the interests of the healing art and progressive in all that the term implies, Daniel Karsner is num- bered among the foremost medical men of Phila- delphia. In as great a degree as in other branches of Nineteenth Century advancement, the study of medicine has been instrumental in bringing about a notable improvement in all that concerns the health, comfort and happiness of the people of this great Commonwealth; and among the brightest sons of the Keystone State are men who have won, in the practice of medi- cine, fame and sometimes fortune. Dr. Karsner is a Virginian by birth, but, through long residence and fellow interests, he is a thorough Pennsylvanian.
DANIEL KARSNER was born June 20, 1842, of parents who were well known in Virginia and contiguous States. They were Dr. Charles and L. M. R. Karsner, and when he was still quite young they removed to Pennsylvania. He was educated at the High School of West Chester, from which he graduated with honors. With this excellent foundation for a more thorough educational training, he entered the Jefferson Medical College of Philadelphia, where his close attention to his studies and his interest in the clinics placed him in the front rank of students. He graduated from that institution with honor just about the time that the rebellion broke out. Shortly after receiving his diploma he joined the Fifth Corps Field Hospital, on the Potomac, as an Assistant Surgeon, which commission he creditably filled until the army disbanded. Returning to Philadelphia he began the regular practice of his profession and for seven years devoted his entire 282
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time and attention to it, meeting with great success. He then decided upon taking up homœopathy as an extra course. Dr. Karsner became very much impressed with the doctrines of the new school, and he finally entered Hahnemann Medical College, of Philadelphia, from which, after a thorough course of study, he graduated with honors. Within a short time he ceased altogether the practice of allopathy and became an earnest homoeopathist. He was elected, in recognition of his services to the cause of the new school, a member of the staff of Hahnemann College Hospital, and was also appointed a member of the Advisory Board of the Hahnemann College. In these offices Dr. Karsner met with the same honor and success that marked his career in other fields. After occupying these positions one year his executive qualities and his splendid command of business and professional details gained him a place on the Board of Trustees, of which he is still a valued member.
So great has Dr. Karsner's interest been in the affairs of the homeopathic branch of medicine that he has been identified with many movements for the perpetuation and dissemination of its doctrines. For a number of years he has been one of the most progressive and active members of the State Homoeopathic Society of Pennsylvania, and his services have always been found of con- siderable value in the detail work of that well known professional organization. He is also a member of the American Institute of Homeopathy, as well as a member of the County Society of Philadelphia. His connection with these societies has brought him into considerable prominence, and from time to time the medical papers which he has read at their meetings have exhib- ited a considerable degree of acumen and a complete familiarity with the subjects in hand. In his private practice, it is hardly necessary to say, Dr. Karsner has won a prominent success. Socially he is a highly popular man and, as a member of several leading clubs, he has demonstrated his fitness for participation in matters other than those connected with his profession. Among the organizations of which he is a member are the Philadelphia Country Club, the Philadelphia Art Club, the Manheim Cricket Club and the Philadelphia Cricket Club.
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In 1890 Dr. Karsner married Miss Caroline M. Jeans, a charming Philadelphia belle, and a daughter of Isaac Jeans, one of the city's most widely known citizens and philanthropists. Mr. Jeans was ranked among the wealthiest and most representative Philadelphians, and the marriage was a notable one. Dr. Karsner is one of the best known physicians in the Keystone State, and throughout Philadelphia, especially in Germantown, where he has his largest clientele, his progressiveness is appreciatively recog- nized. His house, at the corner of Tulpehocken and Green streets, Germantown, is one of the largest and finest private resi- dences in that section of the city.
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John F. Fication
JOHN F. KEATOR.
ROM the farm to the State House seems a long F step, but it is one which many of the best men of the State of Pennsylvania have taken during a century of progress and enterprise. That the Commonwealth has been exalted into the con- dition of prosperity and power which it occupies among the States of the Union to-day is practically by reason of the individual efforts of those of its sons who have, in advancing themselves, established the wealth and the fame of the State. John Frisbee Keator, member of the Legislature from the Twenty-first District, goes to his official duties as one of the most able and upright of the Representatives sent by the people of Pennsylvania to the city of Harrisburg. At the Bar he has won lasting recognition, and now, in the political field, he is attaining both prominence and a sterling reputation.
JOHN FRISBEE KEATOR, whose home is at 218 West Walnut Lane, Germantown, Philadelphia, was born at Roxbury, a post village, in Roxbury Township, Delaware County, Catskill Moun- tains, New York, on April 16, 1850. His parents were Abram J. and Ruth Frisbee Keator. On his paternal side he is of Hol- land Dutch descent and on his maternal side he has a Scotch strain. His great-great-grandfather was a patriot in the Revo- lutionary War and met his death at the hands of the Indians. Mr. Keator's origin was humble, and the story of his life is one of hard work. At five years of age he went to the common school which was a mile away from the farm house in which his family lived. At seventeen he taught country school for three winters in order to obtain sufficient means to prosecute his studies, after
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which he went to Easthampton, Massachusetts, where he attended Williston Seminary and took a preparatory course for Yale. He entered the College Department and applied himself most studi- ously. In 1877 he was graduated with the degree of B. A., and, in 1879, at the University of Pennsylvania, he attained the degree of LL.B. While at Williston Seminary he took the first prize for excellence in oratory. He was there under the tutorship of the now well known Rev. Charles H. Parkhurst, and he states that he owes Dr. Parkhurst a great debt of gratitude for the wise counsel received from him at that time.
He was admitted to the Philadelphia Bar in 1879. His prac- tice at once attained considerable proportions, and he, as counsel, became identified with many notable cases. In 1888 Mr. Keator became associated with J. S. Freemann, and since that time has been a member of the well known law firm of Keator & Freemann, whose offices are now at 400 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia. In 1890 Mr. Keator was admitted to the Supreme Court of the United States, at Washington, D. C., and his practice at the larger Bar became an important adjunct of his professional duties. He has also served on the Examining Board for admission of students to the Bar.
Mr. Keator, aside from the practice of his profession, has found time to devote considerable of his talent to the furtherance of the interests of the people. When, in the fall of 1896, certain reform measures were instituted in various sections of Philadelphia, Mr. Keator was selected to represent the interests of the Business Men's League and carry their standard in the political battle which ensued when the election in November took place. He was elected a member of the Legislature from the Twenty-first District after a fierce contest and, from that time on, he has demonstrated his entire fitness for the trust then imposed in him by the people. Mr. Keator had never sought political honors, and his nomination for the Legislature was a most complete surprise. He defeated his opponent by eight hundred majority, having run two thousand ahead of his ticket. He served in the Legislature upon the most important committees.
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He was appointed Attorney for the House of Representatives' Committee to investigate the cause and effects of the fire which destroyed the State Capitol. Although it was his first term he was one of the leaders of the House. Mr. Keator's course throughout the session was invariably in favor of all legislation for the best interests of the people irrespective of partisanship. He opposed by voice and vote the "Beaker Bill," the "Simon Bill" and the bill taking the advertising of liquor licenses from the courts and putting it in the hands of the clerk of Quarter Sessions. He advocated abolishing the Philadelphia Building Commission and was a strong advocate of the bill which secures to the State, interest on its deposits. He is a man of quiet but genial disposition and makes many friends. But he is an eloquent, determined and fearless advocate of the people's interests at all times. His name has been prominently mentioned by the press in connection with the State Senatorship and as a popular candidate for Receiver of Taxes of Philadelphia.
Mr. Keator was for two years Master of Harmony Lodge of Masons, and was also a member of Harmony Chapter and Corinth- ian Commandery. He was one of the charter members of the Young Republican Club, of Philadelphia; is a member of the Young Re- publican Club, of Germantown ; the Wissahickon Wheelmen; the University Club; Lawyers' Club, the Psi Upsilon Fraternity, and many similar organizations. Mr. Keator is fond of horses, and he takes an annual coaching trip to the Catskills, where his aged mother still resides.
He is well known at the Bar and throughout the business community as a man of ability and integrity, and he is in every sense thoroughly representative of the spirit of enterprise and progress which has done so much to establish the prosperity of the Commonwealth.
WILLIAM W. KEEN.
HROUGHOUT the world of medicine the name of William Williams Keen is a well known and hon- ored one. Doctor Keen has filled some of the highest offices in the leading colleges of the coun- try, and has written many profound and notable works in medicine and surgery.
WILLIAM WILLIAMS KEEN was born in Philadelphia, January 19, 1837, his parents being William Williams and Susan (Budd) Keen. His American ancestry dates back to 1642, when Joran Kyn came over from Sweden with Governor Printz. He was the founder of the town of Chester, Pennsylvania, then called Upland. The name Kyn was first "Dutched " into Kien, and later "Eng- lished " into Keen. Many landmarks still survive as monuments to the memory of the early American Keens. Doctor Keen's father was born near Tacony, opposite Keen's Lane, in an old stone house which was built by his grandfather about the middle of the Eighteenth Century, and which is still standing. Doctor Keen was educated in the Newton Grammar School, Thirty-sixth and Chest- nut streets, and in the Central High School from 1849 to 1853, after which he entered Brown University, at Providence, Rhode Island, graduating in 1859. After remaining a year as a resident graduate, he entered the Jefferson Medical College, in 1860, and graduated as M.D. in 1862. In 1861 Doctor Keen was sworn into the service of the United States as Assistant Surgeon of the Fifth Regiment, Massachusetts Volunteers. In 1862, after passing the examining Board for the regular army, he entered the service as Acting Assistant Surgeon, serving until 1864.
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of the war, Doctor Keen began to take a sincere interest in the affairs of various educational institutions and semi-religious organ- izations. In 1873 he was made Trustee of Brown University, and, in 1895, was made a Fellow of the University. He was a Mana- ger of the American Baptist Publication Society and Trustee of the Shaw University; and is a Manager of the American Baptist Missionary Union, a Trustee and Deacon of the First Baptist Church of Philadelphia, Trustee of Crozer Theological Semin- ary and of the Pennsylvania Dental College. He has served as President of the Philadelphia County Medical Society, in which office he attained considerable distinction for his thorough progres- siveness. Doctor Keen has received several degrees, including that of LL.D. from Brown University in 1891.
Doctor Keen's connections are very numerous and important. He is a Fellow of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, a member of the Academy of Natural Sciences, of the American Philosophical Society, the American Medical Association, and the Pennsylvania State Medical Society; a Fellow of the American Surgical Association, and has been elected a Correspondent and honorary member of several foreign medical societies. He is Con- sulting Surgeon of a number of hospitals, including St. Agnes', the Women's Hospital, the Kensington Hospital for Women, the Home for Incurables, St. Joseph's Hospital, in Lancaster, Pennsyl- vania, and others. He has delivered a number of important ad- dresses.
In 1866 he assumed charge of the Philadelphia School of Anatomy, which he managed until 1875, when the Government took possession of the building for the new post-office. In 1876 Doctor Keen became Professor of Artistic Anatomy in the Penn- sylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and he entirely re-organized the teaching in this department. In 1889 he was called from the chair of Surgery in the Women's Medical College to the chair of Surgery in the Jefferson Medical College as successor to the late Prof. Samuel W. Gross, a position still held by him. As an au- thor he has contributed largely to medical journals, and has both edited and written a number of valuable text-books, many of
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which are quoted as pre-eminent authority. He has edited " Heath's Practical Anatomy; " "American Health Primers ; " "Holden's Landmarks ; " "Gray's Anatomy;" and has written with colleagues, " Reflex Paralysis from Gunshot Wounds ; " "Gun- shot Wounds and other Injuries of Nerves ; " "The American Text Book of Surgery," and papers on a large number of other subjects. These include some of the best known works in medi- cal literature.
Doctor Keen was married on December 11, 1867, to Emma Corrina Borden, of Fall River, Massachusetts. She died April 12, 1886. Four daughters were the result of this union: Corrine, Florence, Dora and Margaret, the eldest being the wife of Dr. Walter J. Freeman, Professor of Laryngology in the Philadelphia Polyclinic. Doctor Keen's chief interests at present are in his ac- tive practice of surgery and his associations as an editor and writer. Beyond this he has general scientific, religious and phil- anthropic interests which tend to make him one of the most prom- inent of living Pennsylvanians.
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MONROE H. KULP.
5 T is a remarkable fact that in the development of internal Pennsylvania's most important industries, men of the younger generation have been largely prominent, and, as a result, some of the most prosperous manufacturing and commercial organi- zations of that section of the State are controlled and managed by men who have scarcely reached the prime of life. Monroe H. Kulp, who, both as a member of Congress and a factor in the development of Pennsylvania's enterprises, is widely known, is a notable instance of what may be achieved by young men of pro- gressive tendencies and the natural ability to give ambition force.
MONROE H. KULP, member for the Seventeenth District of Pennsylvania in the Fifty-fourth and in the Fifty-fifth Congress, was born in Barto, Berks County, Pennsylvania, October 23, 1858, and is the son of Darlington R. and Elizabeth Gilbert Kulp. Nine years later his parents, who were descendants of leading fam- ilies of that section of the State, removed to Shamokin, Northum- berland County, where his father engaged in the lumber business, which he followed during the rest of his life. He took an active interest in the advancement of what was already a thriving coal town. After attending the public schools of the neighborhood for several years, the son, Monroe, as was the custom, went to work at the collieries, and in a few years commenced to learn the lum- ber business. By the time he was twenty years of age he had filled nearly every position in the two lines of work in which he had been engaged. The influence of his father, his interest in public affairs, and his association with the rank and file in his daily vocation thus brought him in touch with all classes.
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As he grew older and came in contact with other men, Mr. Kulp felt the importance of having a more thorough education than the public schools afforded, and, in 1878, he entered the State Nor- mal College, Lebanon, Ohio, and, in 1881, he graduated with honors from Eastman National Business College, Poughkeepsie, New York. He immediately commenced his business career by accept- ing the position of bookkeeper and cashier for Kulp, McWilliams & Company, which place he held until the dissolution of the firm, in 1886, when he became the general manager for his father, who assumed the entire lumber interests of the company. He con- tinued to serve in this capacity during the long illness of his father, having entire charge of all his enterprises, until October, 1895, when, together with his brother, G. Gilbert Kulp, and D. C. Kaseman, the former bookkeeper of the concern, he formed the firm of Monroe H. Kulp & Company, and added general construc- tion to their already large business, forming connections with other firms which enabled them to supply all kinds of timber and lumber used within their territory. Finding the supply of prop timber rapidly disappearing, Mr. Kulp, in 1897, secured about 25,000 acres of land in Union and Centre counties, and organized Monroe H. Kulp & Company, Incorporated, and the Lewisburg and Buffalo Valley Railroad Company, of which he became the President and General Manager, in addition to his position as general manager of Kulp, Thomas & Company, of Milroy, Penn- sylvania. He has numerous other business interests, all indicative of his energetic nature and his love of progress, and the most important of these are found in his office as President of the North and West Branch Telephone Company, and a Director in the Shamokin Water Company, the White Deer Creek Water and Sup- ply Company, the Salt Lake Oil and Gas Company, and the Anthracite Sewer Company.
In the same year, in company with C. R. Savidge, of Sun- bury, Pennsylvania, he purchased from the Pennsylvania Railroad Company about eighty-seven acres of undeveloped real estate adjoin- ing the borough of Shamokin, and laid out the two important additions, Fairview and Edgewood, which have since become noted
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for their value for building and manufacturing purposes. Being, thus, essentially a business man, Mr. Kulp, while an ardent Republican, never took an active interest in politics in his own behalf until 1890, when, at the solicitation of many friends, he was a candidate for the Legislature. Owing to the fact that his nom- ination would have caused an unequal distribution of the offices among the several sections of the county, he withdrew from the field, notwithstanding that his success was generally looked for. This action made him more popular than ever, and, in 1894, with- out any solicitation whatever, he was made the nominee of the party for Congress. The District had always been strongly Dem- ocratic, and the nomination was looked upon as more honorary than profitable, but so actively did Mr. Kulp take up the work, and so faithfully did the friends he had made by his genial dis- position and trustworthy qualities stand by him that when the returns came in it was found that the adverse vote had been over- come and he had been elected by a majority of nearly a thousand.
During his term in the House of Representatives Mr. Kulp served as a member of the committees on Public Lands and Man- ufactures, being Chairman of a sub-committee of the former, in charge of the Public Land Offices of the United States. In his work in this new field he applied the same principles which had won for him a name in other lines, paying the strictest attention to the wishes of his constituents without distinction as to party affili- ations or financial standing. His re-election, in 1896, by an increased majority, was only the natural result of his splendid first term record.
Mr. Kulp was married on June 8, 1897, to Sara Washington Detweiler, of Harrisburg, and took up his residence in Shamokin, where he might devote his time to his numerous business enter- prises and public duties.
JOHN D. LANKENAU.
LIFE begun amidst a haze of romance; a purpose A worked out with an iron will; a success achieved through endurance never dulled-that is the his- tory of JOHN D. LANKENAU, named at birth Johann Diederich. He was born in Bremen, March 18, 1817, and attended the most prominent schools of that city, his father undoubtedly expecting him to become a partner in the business which he had founded. His parents were both of German stock, though, by a strange chance of fortune, they were married in Marleybone Chapel, London. It was during Napoleon's sweep across Europe, and when Bremen was in the hands of the French, that Elizabeth Windeler, then a little girl, was sent away from the scenes of warfare and conquest to the care of an uncle in London. There she remained for thirteen years, and grew to charming womanhood. Johann Lankenau, the father, then young in years and in business, was one of the daring merchants who carried on their trade by running the French blockade between England and Russia. He came often to London, met the young lady from his native city, and, when the war was over, married her. Returning to Bremen, he founded the wholesale "Colonial" house of Lankenau & Tiersch. His son, Diederich, as he was called, had studied in the "Handelsschule"-the business college- and on his graduation was received as a clerk in the firm of Tiersch & Gerischer, the name under which the house transacted its business after the retirement of the elder Lankenau. After three years' service, during which he attracted the favorable atten- tion of merchants at that port, he was engaged by Mr. Wicht, of Wicht, Werner & Company, dry-goods importers, of Philadelphia.
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The firm of Tiersch & Gerischer attended to the shipping of all goods purchased by Mr. Wicht, who was himself a resident of Bremen. On August 4, 1836, he sailed away upon his real start in life, and landed in Baltimore September 15th. A few days later he had arrived in Philadelphia, and went to work in Wicht, Werner & Company's office, at Front Street and Norris Alley. Mr. Werner retired in 1840, and Wicht & Sayen conducted the business of the house until 1845, when both members of the firm died. On April Ist of that year Mr. Lankenau, with a nephew of Mr. Wicht, formed the firm of Wicht & Lankenau. This business was continued until 1865, when it was brought to a close by the war, and the two partners retired with a competency that warranted comfort and leisure for the rest of their lives. Meanwhile Mr. Lankenau had taken a wife, Mary Joanna Drexel, daughter of Francis Martin Drexel. The marriage had about it a delicate touch of romance. Mr. Lankenau first met his father-in-law that was to be one day when preparing for a business trip to Germany. The young mer- chant had been for years an ardent lover of music, and there met regularly at his room a little coterie of amateur musicians. The meetings were resumed on his return from Europe. One evening the usual violinist could not come, and a member brought with him Francis Anthony Drexel, the banker's son, who was a violinist of some talent. He was so delighted with the congenial company in which he found himself that he invited them to his own house for their next meeting. There was a violent storm that night, and Mr. Lankenau found that he was the only member of the amateur orchestra who had braved rain and wind. They made the best of it, however, and played trios of flute, violin and piano until late in the evening. The pianist was Mary J. Drexel. She was married to Mr. Lankenau on October 9, 1848.
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